Editor’s note

Miami wears its heart on its sleeve when it comes to real estate.

You can see booms and busts coming a lot easier than in other parts of the country.

Fortunately — for now — we are in middle of the good times, as The Real Deal’s latest South Florida Market Report shows.

How else to explain the sky-high prices being asked for pre-construction projects in South Florida? The average price at the top project, Ian Schrager’s Edition in Miami Beach, is $2,600 a square foot. That works out to $1.3 million for a 500-square-foot studio, a price that would have been unthinkable a few years ago, though brokers like to point out now that Miami is still a bargain compared to other “world cities.”

Records are being set left and right, and we tally up the new benchmarks. We also take a look at the explosive growth in Doral (the city’s mayor predicts a 50 percent population jump in the next two years) and examine how condos in rapidly changing Brickell are trying to lure families.

And check out our profile of developer Gil Dezer, one of the scions of South Florida real estate, whose taste for fast cars is a fitting metaphor for the market and whose novel condo project, Porsche Design Tower, is nearing the finish line for sales; in typical South Florida fashion, construction hasn’t even begun.

Finally, we are pleased to welcome real estate guru Peter Zalewski as a columnist. It’s hard to think of a market commentator as influential as Zalewski, the founder of Condo Vultures, and now Cranespotters.com, which tracks new construction.

Enjoy the issue.